Patriots' Mike Vrabel Breaks Down Screen Passes

With just over a minute remaining and the New York Giants leading the New England Patriots 21-10, backup quarterback Tommy DeVito tossed the ball to running back Jonathan Ward out of the backfield.

In an instant, Ward turned on the jets and took thw screen pass 41 yards for the Giants' fourth touchdown of the night. It was a bad defensive breakdown by the Patriots, who later walked out of MetLife Stadium after losing by 32 points.

On Friday, Patriots head coach Mike Vrabel spoke about what goes into defending screen passes, and how the breakdown from the day before can be rectified.

"Screen defense is, again, about recognizing, one, that they're kind of letting you go, right? So, they invite the end up inside, the tackle usually oversets when we're talking about running back screens. Being in man coverage, if you have to go and hug, and if you're in zone coverage, now we've got to have eyes and we have to go and break and trigger and avoid, usually linemen, in space," Vrabel said. And the defensive linemen are really – you want to be a good screen defense, you have to have linemen that recognize quickly that they're letting them – letting you go inside and then they put their foot in the ground and they're chasing to the back hip of that offensive lineman, right?"

Once Ward got through the first level, he burned past Patriots safety Marcus Epps down the seam. The help over the top wasn't able to adjust to Ward's speed and he was gone for six.

"Where the backs usually try to cut back in, and we want to chase at the back hip and be able to impact that play.," Vrabel said. "I think it starts there. Whether it's in zone coverage, now it's, "Hey, am I leveraging this football to a corner? Am I leveraging it to a safety?" And last night, on the long one, it was zone, and the big thing for us is when a defensive lineman goes in a gap, stay in that gap so that the second level and the third level can play off of you."

Vrabel did mention that the team had been good at defending screens all summer throughout training camp and singled out how they played in their second preseason game to showcase why it can be fixed. But Vrabel is certain the screen passing game will adjust to the new-age NFL.

"I'd also be curious to see if in the last couple of years, the perimeter screens, right, have gone down, their effectiveness and the amount in which people call them, because you can't cut, right? Linemen – that's a timing play when you're trying to get a tackle out to the to the nickel, right? And now – in the past, they used to be able to just run and throw at them and it would time up. Now that you can't cut, I just – we run them, people run them, they have them, I just haven't seen those be great plays like they were because the linemen can't go out there and cut," Vrabel said. "So, we have to know, even on those running back screens, how do we stick and avoid a big player when we know that he can't cut? Because those used to always be cut opportunities for the offensive linemen."

While most of the players who defended Ward's touchdown on Thursday won't be on the roster when the regular season rolls around, getting dusted on a long play in August could benefit the Patriots once November and December hits.

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